Victor E. West

VICTOR E. WEST, a live and enterprising real estate man at Ransom, has lived nearly all his life in Western Kansas, and knows Ness County like a book. He has the best years of his life still before him, and yet has already won an enviable place in business affairs.

He was born in Nodaway County, Missouri, May 15, 1883. His father, Eber T. West, who came to Kansas in 1887, was born at Xenia, Ohio, and was married in that state to Miss Ann J. Fish, an orphan girl who came from England when four years of age. She was born May 6, 1839, and died April 19, 1916. Eber T. West died July 24, 1915. Their children were: Delia, wife of Frank Church, of Puente, California; E. Clem, of Scott City, Kansas; Cora A., of Puente, California; E. Frank, of McCracken, Kansas; Wilber C., of Broomfield; Sylvia, wife of Arthur Giddings, of Arnold, Kansas; and Victor E.

When the West family came to Kansas in 1887 they spent two years in Osborne County on a farm, and Eber West then homesteaded a claim in the eastern part of Ness County. He proved up his land, and like most of the settlers of the frontier lived within narrow means and gained a modest prosperity by the hard labor involved in making crops in Western Kansas. During the last few years of his active life he was engaged in merchandising in Ness City. He followed the faith of the democratic party for a number of years, afterwards became a populist. He was a member of the Christian Church.

Victor E. West, who was four years of age when the family came to Kansas, lived at home until he was twenty-five years of age. He received an education in the common schools, also attended high school at McCracken, and after leaving the farm was employed in the store of his brother at Ness City and Ransom. He has been a resident of Ransom since 1904, and on leaving merchandising he entered the real estate business in 1909, associated with P. T. McNinch, under the firm name of McNinch & West. Later Mr. West was associated with his own brother for a time, but is now alone in his work. He handles real estate as a broker and has been very successful as an emigration promoter, having interested and brought to Ness County many new settlers from other sections. He has also contributed to the improvement of Ransom as a town, and was associated with other citizens in the erection of a two-story and basement business block and other buildings in the town.

Mr. West takes only a good citizen's interest in politics, and in national matters is a republican. He is a member of the Masonic Lodge. In Ness County, in November, 1908, he married Miss Lulu B. Cumbest. Her father, Chris Cumbest, who was an early settler of Ness County from Illinois, was twice married. His children by the first marriage were Ed and Josephine, the latter passing away as the wfe[sic] of Mr. D. Traylor. Chris Cumbest then married Laura (Maxwell) Carr, who by her first marriage had a son, George Carr. Mrs. West was born on her father's homestead northeast of Ransom in Ness County, and the other children of her parents were Frank, Clifford and Nay. Mr. and Mrs. West have no children.